From award-winning and bestselling author David Nasaw, a brilliant re-examination of post-World War II America that looks beyond the victory parades and into the veterans’—and nation’s—unhealed traumas
In its duration, geographical reach, and ferocity, World War II was unprecedented, and the effects on those who fought it and their loved ones at home, immeasurable. The heroism of the men and women who won the war may be well-documented, but we know too little about the pain and hardships veterans endured upon their return home. As historian David Nasaw makes evident in his masterful recontextualization of these years, the veterans who returned to America were not the same people as those who had left for war, and the nation to which they came back was not the one they left behind. Contrary to the prevailing narratives of triumph, here are the largely unacknowledged realities the veterans—and the nation—faced, radically reshaping our understanding of this era as a bridge to today.
In The Wounded Generation, Nasaw illustrates the indelible stories of veterans and their loved ones as they confronted the aftershocks of World War II. Veterans suffering from recurring nightmares, uncontrollable rages, and social isolation were treated by doctors who had little understanding of PTSD. Women who had begun working outside the home were pressured to revert to their pre-war status as housewives, dependent on their husbands. Returning veterans and their families were forced to double up with their parents or squeeze into overcrowded, substandard shelters as the country wrestled with a housing crisis. Divorce rates doubled. Alcoholism was rampant. Racial tensions heightened as white southerners resorted to violence to sustain the racial status quo. To ease the veterans’ readjustment to civilian life, Congress passed the GI Bill, but Nasaw reveals how states disproportionately denied Black veterans their benefits, and how the consequences of this discrimination would endure long after the war was won.
In this richly textured examination, Nasaw presents a complicating portrait of those who brought the war home with them, among whom were the periods’ most influential political and cultural leaders, including John F. Kennedy, Robert Dole, and Henry Kissinger; J.D. Salinger and Kurt Vonnegut; Harry Belafonte and Jimmy Stewart. Drawing from veterans’ memoirs, oral histories, and government documents, Nasaw illuminates a hidden chapter of American history—one of trauma, resilience, and a country in transition.
